The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1887-09-22
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
The Weekly Discourse Of the Great
Brooklyn Preacher
Subject, SLOW to Treat Conn
pany."

TEXT: Given 10 Hospitality. "-Romans,
xii. IL.
There is danger that the multiplication OF
large and commodious hotels in our towns,
and cities, and villages, will utterly extermi-.
nate that grace which Abraham exhibited
when he entertained the angels and which
Lot showed when he watched for guests at
the gate Of the city, and which Christ recog-
nized as a positive requisite for entering
heaven, when he declared: ~ was stranger
and ye took Me in"
Ipropose to speak this morning of the trials
and rewards of Christian hospitality. The
first trial often comes in the within and &C.
centricity of the guest himself. There are
great many excellent people who have pro.
tuberances of disposition, and sharp edges of
temperament and unpliability of character,
~hich make them positive nuisance in any
b. ere they stay. On snort acquaint-
tHE., Ill begin to command the house,
..N order the employees to unusual
sv" unreasonable hours, use narcotics
N offensive to sensitive noStris, put
at unusual elevations, drop the ashes
Havana on costly tapestry, open
bureau hey ought never to touch, and pry
into things they ought never to see, and be-
come impervious to rousing bells, and have
all the peculiarities of the gormandizer or the
dyspeptic, and make excavations from poor
dentistry with unusual implements and in
thousand ways affiict the household which
proposes to take care of them. Added to ALL
they stay too long. They have no idea when
their welcome is worn out, and they
would be unmoved even by the blessing
which my friend Gerrit Smith, the philan-
thropist, asked one morning at his breakfast
table, on the day when he hoped that the
long protracted guests would depart, saying:
30 Lord, bless this provision, and our friends
who leave us to day" But, my friends,
fbara al Law lot ions 70 no mutt fbai do
of the scale Perhaps they have not had the
same refining influences about them in early
life that you have had. Perhaps they have
inherited eccentricities that they cannot help
Perhaps it is your duty, by example, to show
them better way Perhaps they are sent to
patience Perhaps they We're to be intended
as an illustration of the opposite of what
you are trying to inculcate in the minds of
your children. Perhaps it is to make your
home the brighter when they are gone.
When our guests are CHEEKY, and fascinating,
and elegant, it is very easy to entertain
them; but when we find in our guests that
which is antagonistic to our taste and senti-
ment, it is a positive triumph when we can
obey the words of my text and be given to
hospitality"
Another trial in the using of this grace is
in the toll and expense of exercising it. In
the well regulated household things go
foreign element into the machinery, and
though you may stoutly declare that they
must take things as they find them, the
Martha will break in. The ungovernable
stove, the ruined dessert, the joint that
proves to be unmasticable, the delayed mar
keting, the perplexities of caterer, the diff
Guilty OF doing proper work, and yet always
being presentable. Though you may say
there shall be no care or anxiety, there will
be care and there will be anxiety. In 1894
the Captain General provided very grand
entertainment, and among other things he
had fountain in his garden-a fountain of
strong drink. In it were four hogsheads of
brandy, eight hogsheads of water. twenty
five thousand lemons, thirteen hunredweight
of Lisbon sugar, five pounds of grated nut
meg, three hundred toasted biscuits, and a
boat built on purpose was placed in the foun-
tain, and boy rowed around it and filled
the cups of the people who came there to be
urious entertainment, and of course the
man had no anxiety; but have to tell you,
that though you had, or propose, an enter
tainment like that, you have anxiety. In
that very thing comes the Divine reward.
We were born to serve; and when we serve
others we serve God. The flush on that
woman's cheek as she bends over the hot
stove, is as sacred in Gods sight as the flush
on the cheek of one who, on hot day,
breaches the Gospel. We may serve God
with plate, and cutlery, and broom, as GER
tainly as we can serve Him with psalm hook
and liturgy. Margaret, Queen of Norway,
and Sweden, and Denmark, had royal cup
of ten lips, on which was recorded the names
Of the guests who had drunk from this cup
And every Christian woman has a royal cup,
on which are written all the names of those
who have ever been entertained by her in
Christian style-names not cut by human
ingenuity, but written by the hand of a
Divine Jesus. But, m, friends, you are not
to toll unnecessarily Though the fare be
plain, cheerful presidency of the table, and
cleanliness of appointments will be good
enough for anybody that ever comes to
your house. John Howard was invited to
the house of nobleman. He said: Il will
come on one condition, and that is, that
you have nothing but potatoes on the table, II
The requlsition was complied with. Cyrus,
King of Persia under the same circumstances
prescribed that on the table there must be
nothing but bread. OF course these were
extremes, but they are illustrations of the
fact that more depends upon the banqueters
than upon the banquet. l want to lift this
idea Of Christian entertainment out of posi-.
tive bondage into Il glorious inducement.
Every effort you put forth, and every dollar
you give to the entertainment OF friend OF
Zoe, you give directly to Christ. Suppose il
were announced that the Lord Jesus Christ
would come to this place this week, what
woman in this house would not be glad to
wash for Him, or spread for Him bed, or
bake bread for Him There was one of old
who washed for Him, drawing the water
from the well of her own tears He is COM
ing, He will be here tomorrow. " Inasmuch
as We have done it to one of the least of these,
my brethren, ye have done it TO Me" In pict-
ure galleries we have often seen representa-
tions of Walter Scott and his friends, or
Washington Irving with his associates; but
all these engravings will fade out, while
through everlasting ages hanging luminous
and conspicuous, will be the picture of you
md your Christian guests
You see we have passed out from the trials
into the rewards of Christian hospitality
grand, glorious, and eternal. The first re-
ward Of Christian hospitality is the Divine
benediction When any one attends to
this duty, Gods blessing comes upon him,
upon his companion, upon his children, upon
his dining-hal upon his parlor, upon his
nursery. The blessing comes in at the front
door, and the back door, and down through
the skylights. God draws long mark of
credit for services received. Christ said to
His disciples: He that receiveth you, re-
ceiveth Me; and be that giveth cup of cold
water in the name of disciple shall in nc
wise lose his reward. As we have had SC
many things recorded against us in heaven,
it will be satisfaction to have written on
unfailing archives, the fact that in the
month of May, or June, or September, or De
cember, 1887, we made the blissful mistake
of supposing that we were entertaining weak
men like ourselves, when 10! they showed
their pinions before they left, and we found
,ut that they were angels unawares.
Another reward comes in the good wishes
and prayers of our guests l do not think
ones house ever gets over having had good
man or woman abide there. George White
field used to scratch on the window of the
room where he was entertained a passage of
Scripture. and in one case, after he left, the
whole household was converted by the read
ing of that passage on the window pane. The
woman of Shunem furnished little room
over the wall for Elisha, and all the ages
have heard the glorious consequences. On a
cold, stormy winter night, my father enter
tanned Trueman Osborne, the evangelist, and
through all eternity will thank God that
Trueman Osborne stopped at our house. How
many of our guests have brought to use con
lolence. and sympathy, and helD There i;
legend told of St. Sebald, that in his Christ.
ian rounds he used to stop for entertainment
at the house of poor cartwright. Coming
there one day, he found the cartwright
and his family freezing for the lack OF
any fuel St Sebald ordered the man
10 go out and break the icicles from
the side of the house and bring them in